Cookie Cutter??

[Asterial]

With the 3.1 talent build pretty much 99.9999999% confirmed for the patch.... which unfortunately has been delayed (won't be applied to servers next wednesday as originally planned now... maybe the week after) has there been a generally agreed cookie cutter talent build?

I have been 58/13 since hitting level 80
http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/basics/talents/paladin/talents.html?tal=000000000000000000000000001450053500310251533312321502301002000000000000000000

I havent had any problem holding aggro and my average dps has floated between 1400 and 1900 depending on buffs and what/where I am tanking so I have never really found any need to spec to the 5/56/9 build that seems to be favourable...

I have found too many Holy and Retri paladins without Blessings of Kings and many many Death Knights without Unholy Aura to increase speed so I have always needed to keep my own BoK and PoJ.... this has been the main reason for my sticking with 53/13. I've also found that being in a raid or group with maybe 2 or 3 other paladins that they don't seem to run aura's to compliment my own. There are a lot of other non tank paladins out there who seem to raid/group fight the same way as they would doing when soloing... frustrating to say the least.

My main question is now... IS there a cookie cutter raid tank build that everyone has more or less agreed that works well.
I would like to keep PoJ as I find it extremely useful but if it needs to go to enable a better build then it needs to go.
I've checked out the wowhead 3.1 talent builder and got this so far...

59/12 build
http://ptr.wowhead.com/?talent=sZE0tAMuMGsIufdts00b

Is there anything that desperately needs changing or is that build solid enough to enable me to tank as efficiently as I have previously?

[Asterial]

Just to add a couple of points to my post above.

I know a lot of the tanks who use this forum are very serious about gearing up and the actual graphs/mechanics of tanking and a lot of examples of these are with T7.5 gear or with items from 25mans.

Unfortunately being part of a small guild with limited time my equipment is restricted to a few lucky drops and assorted crafted/boss loot from heroics.

I do intend gearing up as much as I can but I am finding it difficult as my only way of doing this is with PUG's... which as you can imagine doesnt always go as planned.

The spec I have created in the above post is for my current equipment... not for future equipment.

[mconeone]

Here's your base:
http://ptr.wowhead.com/?talent=sZV0tAbuMusIufdxo

If you prefer, you can spec into Imp. HoJ instead of DG. That's probably more of a 10-man spec though.

Like you, I prefer PoJ. You can either go with HotC or Imp. BoM and the rest into Benediction. After PoJ, you have 6 points to work with. You can go with increased threat via conviction/crusade, increased healing received via divinity, increased mana regen via SA, or any combination of them.

I plan on speccing for increased threat at first, going 3/5 conviction and 3/3 crusade. If it ends up I don't need it, I'll move those points into Divinity and SA.

[Brokenone]

I'm going to do this:

http://ptr.wowhead.com/?talent=sVZE0tAbuMGsIufdxo

As far as I'm concerned, not taking Divinity, Divine Sacrifice, and Divine Guardian would make a spec sub-optimal for a tanking build. There is no reason currently for me to go 18 points in ret for crusade. I just don't need the threat. Add in that the 4 points on tier 2 are a complete waste, and that the threat from SotP is similar to the threat from Conviction. I think the utility and extra healing from Prot are worth the minimal threat loss. If I have threat problems (haha, if I do the rest of the tanks are screwed) I can spec crusade, but until then I'll be going for max survivability/utility.

Edit: And there is one point left that is going...somewhere...

[majiben]

Divinity is not even close to a useful tanking talent.

[moduspwnens]

I wouldn't give it THAT hard of a rap. Is it a great talent? No, but I'll probably pick it up. I don't think it's quite as "useless" as everyone makes it out to be.

[majiben]

And I thought I being gentle

I removed the "semi" from before useful.

[Spectrum]

Divinity seems useful to me. 5% additional healing is like 5% damage reduction as far as the amount of healing needed goes.

[Jasari]

Divinity seems useful to me. 5% additional healing is like 5% damage reduction as far as the amount of healing needed goes.

But healers aren't able to use a spell that heals for 5% less. They're still using max rank Gheal, HL, etc.

But the debate has been had before. Divinity is worse than mitigation, but better than nothing.

[Brokenone]

Divinity seems useful to me. 5% additional healing is like 5% damage reduction as far as the amount of healing needed goes.

But healers aren't able to use a spell that heals for 5% less. They're still using max rank Gheal, HL, etc.

But the debate has been had before. Divinity is worse than mitigation, but better than nothing.

This is exactly why I will be taking it. Until I need threat, there is no reason not to take even the marginal survivability Divinity provides.

[roachfork]

I'm thinking I'll go with http://ptr.wowhead.com/?talent=sZV0tAbuMusIufdts0hbc since threat from DPS is going to increase quite a bit while it seems ours won't scale at the same pace

[moduspwnens]

This is exactly why I will be taking it. Until I need threat, there is no reason not to take even the marginal survivability Divinity provides.

Indeed.

[Dorvan]

Rather than kick off YADT (yet another Divinity thread), I'd point you to mconeone's post. That *is* the base spec (with the caveat that the points in DS/DG can be spent however you want in early Prot). As long as you have the base pretty much anything goes, but the strongest options are probably:

0/53/18 (Crusade Spec, threat-oriented with PoJ option)
12/53/6 (Imp LoH Spec, for an additional proactive cooldown option)
5/60/6 (takes both 5/5 Div and DS/DG)

I can't be bothered to make links for each of those builds, but if you need clarification please ask.

[majiben]

This is exactly why I will be taking it. Until I need threat, there is no reason not to take even the marginal survivability Divinity provides.

Indeed.

Except that Crusade is not just threat, it's dps as well. There's a decent argument to be made that crusade is better for your survival than divinity. Hell there's a stronger argument to be made that Aura mastery in place of TbtL is a better trade.

The chances of divinity saving a wipe are astronomical.

[Venoseth]

Divinity CAN save your life... Will it? Who knows. Probably not very often.

That doesn't mean it's a worthless talent, it just provides the worst kind of benefit. Why? Because you have to be healed THEN take another hit that would have killed you, had the heal been 1-5% smaller (and only if it wasn't over-healing in the first place, which a lot of healing in the current content [because of the current heal-style] is).